Weiner Mihályné szerk.: Az Iparművészeti Múzeum Évkönyvei 12. (Budapest, 1970)

HOPP FERENC MÚZEUM — MUSÉE FERENC HOPP - Meyer, G. R.: The Museum of Western Asiatic Antiquity in Berlin (G.D.R.) Rebuilt and Reorganized

PROF. DR. G. R. MEYER THE MUSEUM OF WESTERN ASIATIC ANTIQUITY IN BERLIN (GDR) REBUILT AND REORGANIZED In the very centre of Berlin, on a small island, you will find the complex of buildings that house the National Museums. One of them is the Museum of Western Asiatic Antiquity, the third largest collection of ancient remains from the Near East, second only to the British Museum of London and the Louvre of Paris. During the period from 1946 to 1953, we were busy repairing the worst damage done to the building, the rooms, and the collection of the Museum of Western Asiatic Antiquity during the war. It was only in May, 1953, that the Museum could be re-opened to the public. The final object of our efforts, however, was to combine reconstruction with reorganisation. With regard to the rooms of the exhibition, this process of reorganizing was started in 1956. In 1958, the government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.) handed over to the government of the German Democratic Republic, one million five hundred thousand antiques and works of art. One of the institutions considerably involved in this magnanimous act was the Museum of Western Asiatic Antiquity. Under the cultural programme of the government of the German Democratic Republic, museums are to become prominent institutions of public education. This, however, is possible only on condition that their exhibitions strongly appeal to all sections of the population, that is to say they must be modern, lively, easily understood, and yet scientifically correct and scholarly. In re-organizing the Museum of Western Asiatic Antiquity, we made these considerations the basis of our work. As far as space was available, we have tried to present a chronological, though but outlined, survey of the history of the Ancient Near East following the numerical order of the different rooms. If we did not always succeed, this was mainly on account of the items of massive architecture, which of course had to be displayed in the largest rooms available. An attentive visitor will be impressed in many different ways while having a lock round at the Museum of Western Asiatic Antiquity. He will bow to, and admire, the grand achievements of those peoples of the Ancient Near East in the fields of learning and thought, culture, and art; and he will notice that the knowledge and achievements of our time sometimes originated in that period of the past. The bulk of the ancient remains displayed in the Museum was